Neumark's "Hidden Inheritance" is a must read
Craig Dykstra , then at the Lilly Endowment, now at Duke Divinity School, first recommended reading Neidi Neumark's Breathing Space: A Spiritual Journey in the South Bronx , and I bought it a few days later in 2008. It is one of the few books to make both the journey down to South America with me and back to the North again. When I saw that Neumark had a new forthcoming book, Hidden Inheritance: Family Secrets, Memory, and Faith , I made arrangements to have it shipped as soon as possible. Yesterday morning, I finally pulled it from a stack of books on my dresser. It was the perfect tonic for all that besets us this day. I read it straight through, interrupted only by visits to the coffee maker, an email to the author, and my mother's inquiries as she decorated at the Christmas tree. Neumark discloses very early in the book, so this is not a "spoiler," that unbeknownst to her, her father's family was Jewish and suffered in the Shoah (the Hebrew term for wha...